Wireless networks are telecommunication networks that use radio waves to carry information from one node in the network to one or more receiving nodes in the network. Cellular telephony is characterized by the use of radio cells that provide radio coverage for a geographic area, with multiple cells arranged to provide contiguous radio coverage over a larger area. Wired communication can also be used in portions of a wireless network, such as between cells or access points.
Wireless communication technologies are used in connection with many user equipment, including, for example, satellite communications systems, portable digital assistants (PDAs), laptop computers, and mobile devices (e.g., cellular telephones). One benefit that users of such devices can obtain is the ability to connect to a network (e.g., the Internet) as long as the user is within range of such a wireless communication technology. Current wireless communication systems use either, or a combination of, circuit switching and packet switching in order to provide mobile data services to mobile devices. Generally speaking, with circuit-based approaches, wireless data is carried by a dedicated (and uninterrupted) connection between the sender and recipient of data using a physical switching path. Packet-based approaches, on the other hand, do not permanently assign transmission resources to a given session, and do not require the set-up and tear-down of physical connections between a sender and receiver of data. In general, a data flow in packet-based approaches is divided into separate segments of information or packets. The data flow may include a number of packets or a single packet.
One of the key characteristics of wireless communications systems is the ability to support efficient mobile devices. Generally these devices will be involved in wireless data transfer for a subset of time. In those periods between wireless data transfers, it can be beneficial to enable the device to enter a power saving state. In conventional cellular based wireless systems, this is called idle mode operation. One of the key capabilities of idle mode operation is for the network to be able to contact the mobile device, for example to deliver the alert for an incoming circuit switched telephone call or the delivery of one or more down-link packets destined to the mobile device.
In order to optimize idle mode operation, wireless systems can be defined with area codes. These area codes are signaled from the wireless communication system towards mobile devices operating in idle mode. The mobile devices can be configured to repeatedly receive the area code signaled from the system and to then signal the wireless communications system with the mobile device identity and the area code covering the device. Beneficially, the mobile device will only signal its identity and area code whenever the cell covering the mobile device is signaling an area code that is distinct from the when the last area code signaled by the device.
The flattened (i.e., no radio network controller (RNC)) Femto architecture together with small cell sizes can stress established idle mode mobility procedures. Standalone residential solutions are typically defined with distinct location area codes (LACs) and/or distinct routing area codes (RACs) which then trigger Home Node B Application Part (HNBAP) messaging (for UE registering) and Non-Access Stratum (NAS) messaging (for location updating) procedures whenever the UE changes its small cell point of attachment to the wireless communication system. There may also be distinct sets of LACs and/or RACs for Macro and HNB layers. However, applying the same autonomous operation to broader small-cell-deployments may be challenging because of higher mobility that can lead to more frequent HNBAP and NAS signaling procedures.